Vehicle handover report: what a proper report contains and how a dispute is settled

A vehicle handover report is the document of the moment a car passes from one person to another: driver to driver, fleet to customer, customer to fleet. If the report is incomplete, the argument «that scratch wasn't there with me» has no winner; if it is complete, the argument is over in five minutes. This article lists the fields a report must contain item by item, explains why photos + diagram + signature + timestamp are needed together, shows how a dispute is settled on the record, and why the fuel difference should be calculated from the record rather than by hand.

Last updated: 19 September 2026

What does the report document?

Paper reports usually carry a plate, a date, two names and two signatures; the damage part is one line — «clean» or «scratch rear right». When a dispute comes, this is useless: there is no position, no size, no age of the scratch and no photo from that moment; the mileage is not written; the time is unknown. A good report answers five questions definitively: when, who to whom, at what mileage, what state was the car in, and did both sides accept it?

Checklist: what a report must contain

Why photos + diagram + signature + timestamp — all four together?

Each covers for the others' shortcomings. Photos show the real state of the damage, but on their own it is hard to say where and how many; the scratch you need is never found in a folder of forty photos. The diagram positions and counts the damage — «rear right door, 15 cm scratch» — but on its own cannot answer «was it that bad?»; the photo completes it. The signature is the other party saying «I accept this state»; an unsigned report is a one-sided claim. The timestamp says when the photo and the signature were taken; it closes the «taken afterwards» objection.

On paper it is hard to have all four together: the photo is on the phone, the diagram on paper, the signature on another page, the time not written. WhatsApp has photos and a time but no diagram and no signature; and when the chat is deleted, so is the report. That is why the report must live in a single record, attached to the car's card, in a place both parties can reach.

How a report is drawn up in PlakaPro

1. 1Select the car and the other party. Driver or customer; write the mileage and the fuel level on the eight-step scale. In rent-a-car mode the invoice and KABİS boxes are ticked on the same form.
2. 2Mark the diagram. Tap the position of the damage on the body diagram and pick its kind; the old damage from the previous report is already on the diagram, you only add the new.
3. 3Add photos. Four corners and a close-up of every damage; the photos are kept with the report.
4. 4Send the link. A one-time link or QR code goes to the other party; they open it on their phone, see the diagram and the photos and sign with a finger. No account, no app download.
5. 5The report is sealed. A PDF is created with the signature and the timestamp; it sits on the car card and on the driver's / customer's record. When the return report is accepted the fuel difference is calculated by itself. A handover without a report stays flagged on the schedule — a forgotten report lands on the morning list.

The fuel difference: level, litres, the day's price, debt

Fuel is the most argued-about and least written-down item on a report: «half a tank» means two different things to two people. In PlakaPro the level is written in eighths (0/8 … 8/8) and converted to litres with the tank size on the car card. When the return report is accepted, the system finds the handover report for the same driver or customer, compares the two levels and multiplies the missing litres by the branch's fuel price for that day (pulled every morning or entered by hand). The amount is posted to the driver's or customer's account as a debt with the note «fuel difference». A car returned with more fuel only shows the information; nothing is refunded. If the tank size or the day's price is missing, no debt is posted and the report shows a warning.

What happens when there is a dispute?

Example: on Monday the car was taken from driver A and given to driver B; on Thursday B said «there is a scratch on the front left bumper, it wasn't me». With a record the resolution goes like this: the Monday report is opened — no mark on the front left bumper in the diagram, the bumper is clean in the four-corner photos, B's signature and a 09:42 timestamp are there. The scratch appeared during B's period; the damage share is written to B's account. If B objects, they add their comment and their own photo through the link; the objection lands with the manager and the decision is made on the same record. Without a record, the same event is two people's word and three days of argument in a WhatsApp group.

Moving from paper reports to digital

For a fleet that has used paper reports for years the move takes three steps. First an opening report is drawn up for every car: its state today, with all old damage marked on the diagram and photographed — this is the starting point of every later report. Then handovers are done the new way; fleets that want to keep paper too for the first week run the two records side by side and see the difference. In the third step paper ends: the old reports in the archive can be scanned and attached to the car card, but it is not required — the real value is in the record from today onwards. Drivers take one or two handovers to get used to it; signing through a link is no harder than signing on paper.

A printable PDF

The PDF of the report carries the vehicle details, the diagram, the damage list, thumbnails of the photos, both parties' names, the signature and the timestamp. It is attached to the insurance claim file, the customer contract or the written settlement with the driver. For those who do not want paper, the link is enough: the other party opens the same report on their phone whenever they wish.